Baseball

Baseball Wins Series Finale over San Diego, 7-2

The Santa Clara University baseball team salvaged one game of its weekend series with the University of San Diego Sunday afternoon, recording a 7-2 victory at USD's Cunningham Baseball Stadium.

After dropping their eighth contest in the opposing team's final at-bat on Saturday, the Broncos (16-21, 7-7 WCC) sent left-hander Matt Travis out to the mound for the start in game three. Travis came through in a big way for Santa Clara, throwing 8 1/3 innings of work in which he allowed only one earned run on seven San Diego hits.

Senior closer Grant Feichtmeir came on in relief in the bottom of the ninth inning to record the final two outs of the game, both on popouts. Travis improved to 4-1 on the season while lowering his ERA nearly one full point down to 4.25.

The Broncos scored their seven runs on 13 hits, four of which came from catcher Jim Wallace who finished the day 4-for-4 with a home run, double, one run score, one walk and four runs batted in. Sunday's game was the first time in Wallace's collegiate career to get four base hits in one game.

A.J. LaBarbera chipped in three hits with one run batted in while Jack Headley collected two hits of his own with one RBI. Freshmen Ryan Pierpont and Shawn Epidendio each added a hit to the Bronco total with Pierpont scoring once. Joey Gomes collected his 20th double of the season in the sixth inning while Joe Diefendefer picked up the other Bronco hit.

San Diego (29-12, 11-7 WCC) was stymied all day long by Travis, failing to put together an inning in which they recorded more than one hit. The Broncos turned two double plays on the day including a lineout to the pitcher in the sixth inning off David Bagley's bat that allowed Travis to double-up Jason Marian at second base, saving what would have been a run if the ball got passed Travis.

Aaron Wilson took the loss for the Toreros and fell to 5-3 on the season after allowing three runs on eight hits in 5 2/3 innings of work. After Mike Osuguera allowed one run in his 1 1/3 innings of work Chad Cummings came on for USD an allowed two runs in only 2/3 of an inning on the mound.

The win pushes Santa Clara's record back to .500 in the conference and keeps them in the same place they were going into the weekend, just 1 ½ games behind Pepperdine for the lead in the West Coast Conference Coast Division after the Waves dropped two of three contests to Loyola Marymount.

Santa Clara will return to action at home next week, hosting San Jose State at 6 p.m. Tuesday night at Buck Shaw Stadium. The Broncos will resume WCC action next weekend as they welcome the University of Portland to "The Shaw" for a three-game set beginning Friday evening at 6 p.m. Saturday and Sunday's games are both scheduled for a 1 p.m. first pitch.